


Sidesplitter.

by siano_t



Category: Call of Duty (Video Games), Call of Duty Zombies
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood of the Dead, Flashbacks, Heartbreak, In-depth summary included in end notes, Just in case :), M/M, POV Third Person Omniscient, Pining, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:29:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22501756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siano_t/pseuds/siano_t
Summary: Ever since the loss of their Edward, Dempsey couldn’t help but have a hole in his heart, but he couldn’t remember what for. Not to mention, this new Edward wouldn’t leave him be for the life of him.
Relationships: "Tank" Dempsey/Edward Richtofen
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22





	Sidesplitter.

**Author's Note:**

> Said I couldn’t love someone  
> ‘cause I might break  
> If you’re gonna die,  
> not by mistake

Prévenance of the meticulous, brought from the horrendous deliberate wonders; he always found himself wondering back to the lovely little library of ghastly gore, preferably to the young perfect little memories of frigid France.

Why? Edward never knew. Maybe he'd find the vital disclosure before the sanguine in his veins depleted.

________

During their wee-bit of a caesura, Edward found himself in a somewhat, relatively orderly room, fingers lurching into his buoyant medical gloves. His verdant-green eyes flickered towards the marine sitting miserably on the doctor's desk, the doctor pulled up onto a chair and chest leaning forward. He was met with an immediate reaction, accompanied by angry blue eyes and the furrow of a snarl. “Stop looking at me like that.”

The worn German would look up, bewildered, the faint wrinkle over his cheek that made a momentary smile, fading. The little thread of the needle is whisked between his teeth as he holds the sliver of silver between his pointer and thumb of his right hand, “What?”

There's a smooth, yet, unthinking fluid motion that has his left thumb puncturing something. A sprinkle of red caused the man to grunt commodiously, the base of his boot punting the ledge of the table as the erudite doctor cursed shortly. “Dempsey! You fool!”

The marine's caterpillars for eyebrows pinch together, "Fool? What the fuck? You did it!" The doctor watched in silence, wonderstruck, dallying the needle in his fingers as he stilled the urge to smile. “Next time, I'll patch my own shit up.”

And they all knew he was no surgeon.

________

He the one obsessed with futuristic tones and science, he the one known as the man that promised to fulfil the ambitions of many, but never could; was an outlandish, indisputably insecure, green-eyed fraud that had tempted three war soldiers, trapping them in a super-temporal, dispirited world. A cycle, id est, one that he knew how to break, but he would often lie about his knowledge, so much so that his companions became aware of his indubitable reliance of self-authenticity. They mumbled amongst themselves, gutter-talked the doctor who simply chose to pretend that he had not heard. It was the smarter decision, and though he was a strong manipulative liar, he was very protective over them despite his personal preference of choosing silence over speaking the truth.

Edward helped them, even when they badmouthed his decisions. And enough as that was, he never had it in him to hate even one of them. The Russian was the worst, slurring his burning hatred for the doctor while managing to still sound so dangerously calm, chortling at the pain and even more at the mere thought of Edward's throat in his fingers. He never trusted Edward, and Edward understood why.

Forcefully clearing his own futile thoughts, the ones that questioned his own sanity, he told himself that he didn't need to earn their trust because he tricked them anyways. He garnered up all of their sacrifices just to secure them a better tomorrow, and himself another life. It brought much dismay— he was a great bringer of dismay— and each time they would keep their silence, but this time was different. This time, they turned to him and expressed their anger. “You lied to us again, Richtofen!”

Edward had snorted, eyes lulling on the view of the floor, wreaking of hidden guilt but he would never show it. “Caught me again,” and he'd said it with a smile.

________

A pulchritudinous night, the first night, had ended with poised comfort, despite the occasional peaks of disputes, which was typical and was commonly thrown beneath the rug. The rug, Edward remembered, the very crimson one, laced with cotton curls and sewn patterns, the one that had been dented with knees and shared over devotion one rough night. He simpered on the hour that felt as if he were wrapped in blankets of fire. Who ever said it wasn't in him to adore the fortune gifted his way? Especially when everything had been so bad for so long?

The fervency of the situation hadn't initiated itself on the doctor until he found himself in it, the back of his head nudged into the wooden barricades of the window as his favoured pressed his kisser to his jaw. “Stop,” he groused unwelcomely.

The jumble of dark blonde, no longer gelate or parted but tousled over his scalp, swabbed over the doctor's cheek. His hooded eyes coruscated momentarily, and as the rich-tan fingertips mounts upwards, the marine grimaced dishearteningly. “Don't you even think about touching my hair.”

“But you like it.” Edward beamed transiently, watching with content as the marine cinched his wrist. He saturated his own brim, folded upwards against the inner roof of his jaw. And though the behaviour from the other only grew more debatable, just the light beginning threat of a plight, he doesn't deny his upper appendage wrapping itself around the nape of the marine to pull him closer, eloping him into a future that was surely to see the better tomorrow.

________

Reminiscing, but never knowing, of the place full of deplorable flashbacks. His eyes grew weary, his mind like fuzz. Leathery fingers clasp roots upon roots of golden strands. Evanescent, but never dying. There, but illogical. How could that be? Recollections on trivial things like boot camp, his first girlfriend, his first absent aide, but never his own birth name or the times he had with a German that meant more than it should've.

Thomas could never admit it, his aspiring wishes, the ones that could never be granted. He never got to have things his way, could never be given things, and he would live on that. And just as he peaked his lowest, slow enveloping and giving into his own dark mind, a profound of a German seraph pitched his palm on his shoulder, and said everything would be okay. Thomas would live, and if that wasn't enough, he offered to give him a reason to live.

That reason was gone now, Thomas realises, and it isn't up until now that he's made aware that Edward was never coming back, left to die by drainage. He's temporarily blinded by miles of lusters of blue, made groggy by the gales that feels as if he were drifting from the head of Thor. He had staggered out of the portal, roundly plunging if it weren't for the crowns of his hands meeting the brims of his boots. There was no qualm in saying that the wavering of gazes hadn't run over him, and as he doubled over, he began heaving as if he were underwater, drowning in his own hysteria.

A hand warmed his shoulder, and thereupon, his daze is ruptured enough to put together his disintegrated vision. He struck the foreign limb away, jostling his own into the chest of an unbothered which only fuelled his perpetual hatred. “Don't you fucking touch me!”

The German man with the polished ebony hair holds his arm out in front of him, frowning subtly, brows hiking upwards in what looked to be surprise. The marine stepped forward for there to be just a scanty amount of inches between them, his gaged finger jabbing the beige man in his chiffon-and-wine robe, the one he could not bear to perceive, “Don't you _ever_ fucking touch me,” he spoke, as hoarse as the gravel beneath their soles. Just as the other remaining grew near, he took only a second to deceitfully stand upright, towelling the gleam on his cheek. Grasping his firearm, he distended a frail smirk towards his brothers as the howls of the damned pierced the air, “Let's kill some shit.”

________

Of course, not everything fell perpetual as of human leak of sentiment. He's an observer, it's what he does best, so he admits he never missed the way his especial cerulean-eyed accomplice hug down against his shoulder, would push anyone away when they got close when he usually wouldn't have. Ever since that day, things had been different. Desultory glances and consistent hesitation would assure that. In honesty, he was desolated, heavy-hearted, something Edward knew of and fell completely empathetic to. His own melancholic memories, plus his passion for cerebral subjects, had him pushing to the climax of poor Dempsey's mind because he wanted, needed, to understand. He'd been protruding after the American, nudging him with questions, touching him whenever he could or whenever Dempsey allowed him to, even watching him with fascination and never forgetting the way the man bent down at one knee to finish the round, eyeing a barely gasping crawler, solemnly expressing his sorrow for it before sticking a blade through its skull.

He'd remember the rest of that night. He hadn't been wondering about anything but their next move, everything he had been worried about had rolled into the back of his mind as he seated himself on the steps surrounded by ceiling remnants. It wasn't until a certain American caught his gaze did the thoughts immediately rebound, his eyes heaving up from the book settled in his lap to watch the man settle down, unsure. “Are you alright?”

The man looked over, motley face scrunched in irritated befuddlement. “What do you care?”

“Have you been feeling alright?” The American looked to be unsure with an answer, even with the question itself, mouth apart, face twisted as if he were ready to cuss. There was no more colloquy that night, and Edward expected that. After all, it was another cycle he found manageable.

________  
  


This night had been dingy, amble with infrequent whiffs of weather and lit by only the waning moon. The doctor had left on a furlough, apologising in a mutter to those who he had awakened before standing upright. Over his shoulder, the two had begun to sleep, but land one short. Hereupon exiting the demolished building, he distinctly wished to himself that he had worn a coat for once. It was cold, and since it was just the dawn of midnight, it would only get colder.

The emulated doctor swayed by the wooden ledge, where stood the quick-witted third, tranquil and just as silent, leaning on the bulk of the timber, arms crossed and ankle bobbing. Surely by now he would've turned and aimed directly at Edward's temple, but to his surprise, he kept his eyes straight ahead. “Mind if I join you?”

The American's hooded eyes flicked aside, briefly closing before moving away. “Yeah.”

“Needed some air?” Edward bordered the marine despite his objection, but is merely met with silence, the only sound being the wind from the air from their current elevation. The joints on his own wrist moved to stroke the man's shoulder blade, who stiffens in return, but didn't withdraw. “I understand how you feel, Dempsey.”

The American blinks warily, and it is now that he leisurely turned to advert at the other, though in contempt. His left eyebrow shifts, nose crinkling at the German who was more of a nuisance than a doctor. “The hell you do.”

The German chuckled in agitation, but elected the decision to remain silent upon observing the marine who stared him down into a make-believe grave of disbelief. He then, too, chuckled, running a brisk hand through his gelled hair, floundering to not be drowned in his own self-pity. “Is this your misanthropic, fucked-up way of trying to make me feel better?”

Edward endured the lull of the weather, watching the picture unravel and simply engaged with the hospitality by moving his palm to grip the other's shoulder confidently, and it was there they began to smile in sync, gingerly but all in good omens.

He wasn't the nicest Edward, _his_ Edward, that was for sure. But it was something.

**Author's Note:**

> Intro: Edward is starting to hallucinate, but can only think back to the memories in Origins, and can’t figure out why, but must before the blood in his body ran out.  
> ___  
> 1: (Edward’s POV) During a break, Edward had been patching an injury on Dempsey, who had suddenly snapped at him. Because of that, Edward lost focus because of how in-love he was with the marine, causing him to make a mistake in the stitching and make the marine bleed worse.  
> ___  
> 2: (Edward’s POV) A flashback that goes further than the previous, this one is in Origins before they all really knew one another. This basically sums up Edward, and his companions’ feelings about him, and though they all changed and care for each other, Edward is still this man, but has grown a softer heart.  
> ___  
> 3: (Edward’s POV) Edward remembers the rug he shared with Dempsey in Der Eisendrache, where on that rug they shared their first kiss. Then he remembered the time Dempsey had backed him into a window, kissing his neck, to which Edward hadn’t wanted because he wasn’t a very cuddly person. Dempsey’s hair then scrapes against the doctor, who attempts to reach to touch it, but Dempsey denied. The night ends with Edward pulling him closer, and knowing that tomorrow would be a better day, even though tomorrow was the day he would die.  
> ___  
> 4: (Dempsey’s POV) It starts off with Dempsey’s struggling to remember things, and can’t find out why it’s only certain things he can remember. He never had anything his own way or was given anything he wanted, but when he was given Edward, something he needed, it was quickly taken from him just when he really loved him. The doctor had saved him from his dark mind, telling him he’d live through it all, and even offered to give him a reason to live.
> 
> Dempsey realises that something important is gone once staggering out of the portal, almost on his knees and breathing as if he were drowning. The new Edward puts his hand on his shoulder, where Dempsey smacks it off and shoved the doctor’s chest. The doctor stares at him in slight surprise, and is clawed forward as threatened by the marine, who quickly wiped own tears and put on a fake smile.  
> ___  
> 5: (New Edward’s POV) A description describing Edward watching the marine, taking note of how different he seemed from the usual him, or all the other Dempseys’. That night, he attempted conversation with him, which was quickly shut down; a cycle he finds manageable because no Dempsey liked him. What he didn’t understand was why this Dempsey liked the now-deceased-Edward, and not him.  
> ___  
> 6: (New Edward’s POV) Edward goes out to get some air, and also on a search to find the marine, who is watching the sky on a ledge outside. Asking to join him and getting denied, Edward joins the marine anyways and attempts to comfort the marine, who is accidentally cheered up upon realising the small similarities this Edward had with someone else, but couldn’t remember. 
> 
> Edward remains silent and allows the marine to think, before they both share a frail smile. This was the new Edward, and the Edward to stay, so he might as well made a time of it, right?


End file.
